Reflecting on Yesterday in Cecil County

Welcome to a Window on Cecil’s Past. On this blog, I will post articles on the history of our county, both old and modern, and the personal stories of its people, first and secondhand. Installments may include pieces on places, folkways, events, the built environment, people, and about any aspect of our past that catches my attention. Additionally, I may periodically contemplate current happenings, as I investigate the convergence of dynamics that are changing our corner of northeastern Maryland in the 21st century. History, after all, is a continuum and understanding what happened in the past provides context for current developments.

The county’s history has fascinated me since 1968 when I started volunteering at the Historical Society of Cecil County as a teenager. For nearly a half-century now, all of my adult life, I’ve had a wonderful time discovering historical traces in photographs, oral histories, documents, and the material culture. In addition to rummaging through old books, documents, and crumbling newspapers as a way of investigating our past I had the privilege of learning so much from many knowledgeable people during those rapidly passing decades. I hope to share some of those insights here. As I search for windows on Cecil Past and post entries, I hope you will find them interesting since the county has so many stories waiting to be told.

I’ve been blogging on local history since April 2007, so I have a number of articles in the blogosphere. To start this weblog off, I will cross post some of my columns from other sites here as I begin reflecting on yesterday in Cecil County with some original essays.